I chuckled against her.
“You don’t have to walk over there. I took it,” I told her. “It’s in my pants pocket.”
She was gone so quick I didn’t even have time to hold on.
I heard her shuffling around the darkened room, and I took pity on her and rolled, switching on the lamp beside the bed.
I nearly laughed as I saw her on her hands and knees as she searched blindly for my pants.
The moment the light lit the room, she darted for my pants and yanked the paperweight out, gasping the moment it touched her skin.
I knew what she was seeing.
Farrow, walking into the room. Picking up paperweights as he tried to find the key to Keifer’s desk. He picked up the last paperweight, then set it down with a loud thump.
When he set it down, though, he accidentally knocked over the cup of water that was sitting on the side of the desk.
Instead of the water flowing off the side, it flowed to the middle.
Farrow, in his haste to stop the water from getting the paper wet, hastily tore his shirt off and sopped up the water, dislodging the jar of pens that was at the corner of the desk.
And spilling out not just the pens, but the key that he’d been searching for.
Once he had the key, he opened the desk and started to sift through files.
The thing about that, though, was that he knew what he was looking for. Knew what was in there. What was good, and what wasn’t.
After taking five files, he locked the desk back up.
Just before he was able to clean the desk, he heard him. Keifer. Walking swiftly to the entrance of the office.
He hastily grabbed his shirt, then ran as quietly as he could to the corner of the room and waited.
Keifer entered, took one look at the desk, and then roared.
“Blythe! Your fucking cat was in my office again!” Keifer had yelled.
With his head studying his desk with resignation, Farrow had slipped from the room with an armful of files, and a sneer covering his face.
“So you think he’s taking these files to someone?” she asked me, placing the paperweight on the nightstand and climbing back in bed.
I held the covers to the side, urged her to retake her position by patting my lap, and waited for her to follow my directions.
She did so without a fight, walking across the bed on her knees before straddling my thighs.
“I don’t know what he plans to do with the files,” I admitted. “I can guess, though, but I won’t know for sure what he planned to do with them until I ask him.”
She blinked. “Ask him.”
I nodded.
“Farrow seems to be that kid that everyone babies. What’s the deal with him? Why is he not held to the same standard as everyone else?” Wink asked, crossing her arms over her chest.
I knew what she was asking.
Farrow didn’t work. Farrow didn’t do any reconnaissance like the rest of the dragon riders. Farrow didn’t do anything. When the others did stints of patrols, Farrow wasn’t factored into the list.
“Farrow isn’t like the other dragon riders.”
“Why?” she asked shortly, tired of my evasive answers.
“Farrow was the baby. He didn’t have the same upbringing that Nikolai and Keifer did,” I cleared my throat.
“Neither did you,” Wink pointed out, running her hand down my chest. “But that didn’t turn you into an asshole.”
I laughed. “Thank you, baby.” I let my hands trail up the tops of her thighs. “Farrow saved my life.”
“Why?” she asked. “How?”
I let my eyes move up to hers.
“I was in a bad place,” I said. “I was steadily drinking myself to death when Farrow found me, and then dragged his brother back to me. Keifer forced me to get my shit together.”
Wink grinned.
“He seems like the type to do that.”
“He is,” I agreed. “And so I continue to work with the dragon riders, trying to repay my debt.”
“You don’t want to be here?” she asked curiously.
“At times, no. I’d rather just live my life. This life—one as a dragon rider—it’s dangerous.” I started wrapping her hands around my fist. “And what I hate the most is that I have to go away from you. Your time is stolen from me, and I don’t fucking like it.”
With that pronouncement, I pulled her hair back and exposed her neck to my tongue.
“And I don’t like not being able to have you anytime I want.”
Her eyes dilated as my words slammed into her, making themselves at home in her mind, burrowing deep in her synapses, letting me in exactly where I wanted to be.
“I fucking love you, woman,” I growled, rolling until she was underneath me. “I’ve loved you for fucking ever. You’ve brought my sister back to me. You’ve made me seem almost human in the eyes of the other dragon riders. And you have my back. I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
Her eyes filled with tears.
“Does that mean you’re going to marry me and make it all legal in the eyes of the law?” she asked roughly.
I placed my hand on her neck, wrapping my fingers around her throat, exactly where the mating tattoo was located.
She followed suit, placing her hand on my neck, directly over the tattoo on me.
I yanked her panties down her legs, not caring in the least that they ripped in my haste to get to her pussy.
“Fuck,” she gasped, her legs parting automatically the moment they were free of the constricting fabric.
I fell in between her splayed thighs, notching my hips with hers.
The hard ridge of my erection pressed against the lips of her sex.
“What do you think about kids?” I asked.
Her eyes widened.
“I’m not ready for kids,” she swallowed. “I want them…just not yet.”
I continued to stare at her, and she swallowed.
“I don’t want kids yet,” she said again.
The longer I stared at her, the more uncomfortable she got.
I could read her mind.
I knew for a fact that she wanted kids. I could read the thoughts as they flittered through her mind like multiple hummingbirds trying to fly around the small area at once.
“Wink,” I brought my free hand up to cup her face. “What’s the problem?”
“Can we talk about this later?” she pleaded, her thoughts coming too fast now for me to read them before the next one came.
I studied her face, took in her eyes and her desperate expression, and then nodded my head once.
“Yeah, I can do that.” I murmured. “But one day, I’m going to get this vasectomy reversed. All I need is your opinion on the matter.”
She didn’t have anything to reply.
Chapter 18
A day without coffee is like…just kidding. I have no idea.
-Wink’s secret thoughts
Wink
I stared at the pregnancy test, vomit already starting to make its way back up my esophagus even after I’d spent the last two hours throwing up.
You need to tell him, Mace chastised me gently. He won’t be mad.
I moaned in frustration.
I know. He’s too good for me.
He was, too.
I didn’t deserve him. A man like Ian deserved the world and I’d ruined mine.
I’d lied to him today.
The man I’d seen in the park.
I knew him.
I knew him well.
In the biblical sense, too.
Oh, god.
The baby I was carrying could be Robert’s. Or it could be Ian’s. I knew that just like I knew that whatever was going on right now, that it was going to be bad.
I’d slept with the man one time, and one time only.
Shane had introduced me to him at a party, and I’d instantly found a connec
tion in the man. He was attractive, funny, and a good friend of Shane’s. I’d seen him around quite a bit at Shane’s bar, as well as at other parties.
It’d been my first ever one-night stand, and I wasn’t sure, afterward, just what I’d done.
The sex had been okay, sure.
Nothing like what I had with Ian, but the man hadn’t been a slacker, either.
We’d both gotten off, I’d left the hotel room, and I’d never seen him again.
Until today.
Eight weeks later.
Six of which I’d been with Ian.
I was a slut!
“You’re not a slut,” Ian said, startling me.
I gasped and turned, losing purchase on the toilet bowl and falling to my knees in front of him.
“You’re making yourself sick,” he said, bending down so he could pick me up, one arm going underneath my knees and the other going behind my back.
I started crying.
“You know?” I whispered dejectedly.
“Yes,” he confirmed. “I’ve known you were pregnant for a month.”
My mouth fell open.
“What?” she gasped. “How? I didn’t even know.”
He looked at me.
“I can see DNA, honey,” he told me gently. “Your DNA and the baby’s DNA are different enough that it’s easy to see.”
My eyes closed as his words poured over me like a soothing balm.
“I’ve been trying to figure out how to tell you for a week,” I whispered, my eyes opening to catch his. “You’ve known for all this time and haven’t called me on it yet?”
He smoothed his hand down my hair that was falling every which way out of my sloppy bun on top of my head.
“I’ve known you were pregnant,” he hesitated. “I didn’t tell you I knew because it seemed like you were still processing it in your head.” He smiled then. “I probably would’ve let you tell me, but then you started losing weight because you were worrying yourself sick over what I’d say or do.”
“Who are you and what have you done with Ian?” I challenged him.
He snorted and placed me on the bed, immediately bending to the floor and picking up my flip flops.
“I have a problem at the mill, and I need to go check on it.” He slipped on a flip flop. “You can either come with me, or go to the sanctuary with Brooklyn and Blythe.”
I pursed my lips.
“How long will you be there?” I asked. “All day, like two days ago?”
He shook his head. “Not that I know of. Should be a quick in and out. Something is wrong with the planer. Not that I can fix it, though. I’ll have to call in the repair company.”
I eyed him suspiciously.
“You’re being awfully nonchalant about this…”
Four hours later, I was twiddling my thumbs on the stupid brown stool across from Ian, who was on his back underneath the biggest machine I’d ever seen.
I’d peed twice, searched through the empty refrigerator three times, and had taken no less than ten laps around the huge shop.
Now, I was literally bored out of my mind.
“Ian.”
“What?” he grunted, his large muscles bulging.
“What time are we looking at now?” I pushed.
He growled something at me that I couldn’t quite understand, but the mental picture came through loud and clear.
He wanted me to leave him alone.
Smothering a grin, I got up and started walking to the front room, looking outside and contemplating making a run for it.
Then I saw Mace.
Hey, Ian.
His growled—even through mind speak— answer was quite hilarious.
What do you want, demon?
I really did giggle this time as I watched Mace bring one clawed large paw to the earth and dig it into the grass, spreading his claws in the soft grass like a cat would when it was kneading your skin.
Can Mace fly me to McDonald’s?
And what, take you through the drive-through? he sighed. I think not. Just wait a few more minutes and I’ll be done.
The only person I could blame for the next lapse in judgement was me.
I chose to walk out the door, not realizing that danger awaited outside.
I’d only intended to talk to Mace, yet the moment I stepped foot outside the door something fucking snapped inside of me, and all that made me, me, was gone.
Luckily, or unluckily for me, Mace got to come with.
Chapter 19
Going to Target with Wink is about as much fun as going to a bar with my AA sponsor.
-Ian’s secret thoughts
Ian
I felt it the moment she was gone.
One second she was standing right outside the front door, and the next she wasn’t.
Her mind seemed to just disappear, appearing as if she never existed at all.
I’d just gotten to my feet, when, suddenly, I couldn’t figure out what the hell I was doing down there in the first place.
My body swayed, and it didn’t take long before I was on my knees with my head in my hands.
A scuffle from my right had me lifting my head, my eyes taking in who was in the doorway.
“Hello?” I called.
An old man appeared in the doorway to the large room I was standing in, and it took me a moment to place him.
“Eldridge?” I asked in confusion. “I thought you had today off.”
My mind, which only moments ago was clear, was now confused and cottony like something had clouded my brain. Alcohol or something.
Mr. Eldridge looked at me like I’d said something amusing.
“You’re forgetting already?” he asked.
“Forgetting what?”
“Forgetting what should never be forgotten.”
Then, just like that, he was gone as if he’d never fucking been there in the first place.
“Fuckin’ crazy old man,” I mumbled, pushing myself up to my feet.
My body started to sway, but I stiffened my spine and put one foot in front of the other, heading to the bathroom.
Except the bathroom wasn’t where it was supposed to be.
What I thought was the bathroom had morphed into a fucking kitchen, and what used to be an old storage closet I could tell was now the bathroom.
“What the fuck is going on?” I yelled, looking around the space.
I’d never once seen it before.
Was I in the right place?
When nobody answered my bellowed question, I made my way to the bathroom and immediately headed to the sink, turned it on, and then cupped my hand under the faucet to gather water.
The moment the cool water touched my face, I felt something shift. Something that I knew I’d forgotten.
The cobwebs cleared, and a soft flash of strawberry blonde hair flashed through my brain before it was gone as if it’d never been.
I looked up, staring at my eyes in the mirror, and instantly flinched.
My eyes had lines that weren’t supposed to be there.
My face had fucking hair!
I had a goddamned beard!
Then my eyes lit on the…tattoo?...on my neck.
Since when did I have a tattoo?
“Ian?” someone, a woman, called from the other room.
My hand resting on the small handprint on my neck, I whirled around and stared at my sister.
My sister…my aged sister. She must’ve been twenty years older, but I knew it was her. I would know her beautiful face and gorgeous eyes anywhere.
“Can I help you?”
I acted like I didn’t know her, but I knew she knew it was me.
“Why are you talking to me like that?” she asked. “You were the one to tell me to meet you here. For the life of me I can’t figure out why, though. I haven’t seen you since I was fifteen. Why do I know where you are?”
“What day is
it?” I asked her.
She pursed her lips.
“Umm…” she hesitated. “I have no idea.”
My eyes went around the office, looking for a calendar of some sort like Old Eldridge used to hang on the wall, but I didn’t find a damn thing on the wall but a single picture.
And what I saw in that picture made my heart stop.
My sister looked at me.
“I think we’re missing something here.” She looked at the picture, shoulder rubbing my shoulder.
“That’s…” I strained to come up with a name for the woman wrapped around me in the picture, and couldn’t. “I don’t know. She’s mine, though. That much I can tell.”
“Then where is she?” my sister countered.
I shook my head, unable to come up with a plausible answer.
“I’m fucking lost, and I don’t know where to look, or what to do.”
That’s when the whole goddamned building shook, and I ran outside just in time to see the mill’s entire fucking parking lot fill with dragons.
I stared at the large, dark headed man, wondering what in the hell I’d done now.
My sister, not one to back down from a fight, grabbed hold of my hand.
It didn’t matter that I was only just now seeing her after years upon years apart.
She knew I would protect her, just as easily as I knew that if it came down to a fight, she’d be at my back the whole way.
But the man now dismounting his dragon didn’t mean us harm.
There was something about him, though, that was calling to me.
Not in a weird way, either.
In one that felt right.
“Who are you?” I asked him.
He stared at me.
“You don’t know me?” he asked.
I shook my head.
“No.”
“I don’t know you, either,” he admitted.
My brows rose.
“But something led us here, so we’re here,” he continued. “Now we need to figure out why.”
Chapter 20
Despite being a pain in the ass, you have to admit that I bring a lot to the table.
-Text from Wink to Ian
Ian
It took us two days to figure out why.
The entire forty-eight hours had been harrowing to say the least.
Oh, My Dragon Page 13
